The historic Bridge Hotel in Nowra will close this Sunday, March 22 after 133 years.
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No doubt a lot of us have memories of the Bridge Hotel, Brigade Tavern or just the Tavern.
It was after all "the place to go on a Friday night", followed by, of course, a visit to the "Leaugies" (Nowra-Bomaderry Leagues Club) which "stayed open extra late".
There will certainly be plenty of stories told over the next few weeks as locals reminisce about their times at "The Bridge".
Located on the corner of Bridge Road and North Street, the hotel has a history dating back to 1887.
Local historian Alan Clark published a comprehensive history of the Bridge Hotel in his book Early Years of Nowra District Pubs.
It's colourful history has included numerous licensees, renovations and improvements, associations with numerous local sporting groups, tragedy, death and, of course, there is even a ghost story.
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The Tavern was the brainchild of Nowra's first mayor, Henry Moss, who had conducted the Central Hotel at nearby Greenhills since 1867, but the opening of the Shoalhaven River bridge meant his business was no longer on the main road.
At the time of its opening the Bridge Hotel became the fourth hotel in Nowra - joining the Albion (later renamed the Hotel Nowra) that opened in May 1880 just before the official opening of the bridge, followed by the Prince of Wales Hotel 1883, on the opposite side of the Kinghorne and Junction Street corner.
There had long been a small hotel north along Kinghorne Street where it met North Street, but new owner James Fitzgerald built a three-storey hotel, which opened in 1886 as the Imperial, but had its name changed to the Duff and then the Empire within 16 years (of course, it is now known as The Australian Hotel).
Mayor Moss had pushed for the building of the bridge, and had advertised the Central Hotel on the corner of Ferry Lane, was "within sight of Nowra Bridge".
Moss was granted a conditional licence for the site (corner of Bridge Road and North Street) in January 1885 but by the time two years had passed and the hotel was nearing completion, his health was failing and the licence was transferred to 23-year-old Benjamin Thompson.
While the hotel was located on the ground floor, along with, at times various "parlours", the upstairs doubled as a home for the various licensees and as rooms for hotel accommodation.
The official opening took place on Saturday, January 29, 1887, and it was announced in the previous edition of the Shoalhaven Telegraph as follows:
NOWRA BRIDGE HOTEL
Cnr. of Nowra Bridge Road and North Street.
BENJAMIN THOMPSON desires to inform the inhabitants of Shoalhaven district that he has become lessee of the above hotel recently erected by Mr H. Moss which he intends opening on Saturday next, and that he is prepared to accommodate all whom business or pleasure may bring to Shoalhaven. He is determined to keep nothing but the very best brands of liquor in stock. Superior accommodation for travellers and visitors to the district. The table will be under the supervision of Mrs Thompson.
Charges strictly moderate. Civility and attention.
Large paddocks at rear for the convenience of visitors having horses. Good stabling.
In between her catering duties, Jane Thompson found time to enlarge the family to three children, but sadly, John (2) and Maude (6) both died in a diphtheria epidemic in March 1892. When a third child, Percy died some weeks later, the Thompsons started to have doubts about their future at Nowra and within months they had left the district.
There were regular changes in licensee for the remainder of the 1890s.
W. Muir briefly held the licence, with Frederick Thomas Huxley controlling the Bridge by August 1894, and he made an impact, and among the improvements was to build a wicket on the sports field on the eastern side of the hotel for the convenience of Perseverance Cricket Club.
He was followed by Charles Oke, a former timber merchant from Berry, who was succeeded in August 1899 by Mrs Mary Baker, from Redfern. She died the following October aged 44.
Lloyd Barlow held the licence briefly, and it was transferred in May 1901 to Alexander Pollock but managed by John Walker and his wife.
Pollock's family had been associated with the soft drink manufacturing industry in the district for a lengthy period and his successes with these products at the Chicago World Fair and the Melbourne Centennial Exhibition were mentioned in his advertisement, before it was stated that he stocked none but the best brands of wines, spirits and beers.
When Pollock died in June 1904, the licence was taken over by his widow Honoria, who was succeeded by Arthur Nairn Alexander from Lithgow in 1907.
English-born Thomas Edwin Simmonds was briefly in charge, followed by David Boyd and his wife Ellen.
While Boyd was not a drinker, he did enjoy smoking his pipe after meals and he was tragically killed in an explosion inside the hotel when vapour from spirits ignited, causing the cask to explode and strike him on the head.
His widow Ellen, with three young children, took over the licence and held it for almost a decade. She remarried Nowra baker Ernest Francis Allen in 1921, and there is a reference to him also being a licensee.
The freehold of the hotel was sold in August 1919 to Mrs McDonald, and less than a year later it was reported that £1000 had been paid for a seven-year lease, in addition to the rent.
The new lessee was most likely Walter Stewart who became an influential citizen over the next 10 years and with a new style of entertainment starting to take hold in 1926, the Bridge Hotel had a wireless installed.
Stewart also took a keen interest in the park located just outside the front door, which then featured gardens and a gun that reminded passers-by of the recent World War I.
When the memorial gates at Nowra Showground were to be opened in 1931, Stewart and Arthur Barnes (from the garage opposite) saw to it that the park was tastefully decorated.
Along with neighbour Dr. Fred Rodway and another publican (Ald. Walter Watson) later financed improvements to the park which had become run down.
Bill Batt who became town clerk in 1932, remembered it as "a triangular plot with a broken down fence, full of weeds, and when the men got drunk at the Bridge Hotel, they travelled right through it".
Deciding that something better was needed, Batt designed the traffic island which was built of stone from the Illaroo Road quarry, and the structure still bears his name. Of course, it is affectionately known as "Batt's Folly".
By 1924 the hotel was owned by Tooth & Company and in November 1934 the licence was transferred to Thomas Clark, who was succeeded by Richard William Russell "Dick" Hall in 1938 when the hotel was said to have had 13 bedrooms and a 25-ft. bar.
Subsequent licensees included Albert Kitchen (1957), John Cleary (1958), Madge Cleary (1962), Stanley Bunce (1962), John Halloran (1964), Veronica Malloy (1970) and Graeme Board (1981), and a number of others through to the present day, as the hotel has undergone various incarnations and improvements.
The South Coast Register has tried to gain comment from the group that runs the hotel but has been unable to, with future plans for the historic building, at this stage, remaining a mystery.
- More in depth information on the Bridge Hotel is available in Alan Clark's book, Early Years of Nowra District Pubs, which is available at the Shoalhaven Historical Society's, Nowra Museum.